This book corrects the many lies that racist white Louisianians and their Creole of color sympathizers have been telling about the origins of all things Louisiana for decades. It reclaims Louisiana for the Africans, who were brought there as chattle property to build the buildings, cultivate the land, blacksmith the iron and ultimately create the culture.

As a descendant of Colonial Louisiana Africans, this book was the first to tell me that I am a descendant of the Bamana of Mali. It is one of the only books I have come across to describe in detail, the battles of Louisiana maroon leader Saint Juan Malo. It is one of the first to tell it like it is concerning the true relationship of the French and Africans of this bastard french colony & address the underlying factors of why it became an Afro-creole colony more so than anything else. Basically this book tells the unadulterated truth backed by facts. It doesn't, like so many other books about Louisiana, get caught up in the romance of the Creoles of color and there obsession with their white fathers. Instead it tells the story of their Senegambian mothers. And shows how the culture of these Africans is the foundation of what is now considered Louisiana Creole culture.

This book is a breath of fresh air to some one like myself who loathes the hundreds of books written about Louisiana that describes it as " a mixture of French, Spanish, and Indian cultures". Always omitting the fact of African influence due to the legacy of white supremacy inherent in the telling of US history. In most other books on the subject, Africans are merely slaves. In this book we are shown for what we are, the foundation of the culture. It will most definitely be a textbook in any course I teach on the subject.

Check out the front page article in the July 30 Sunday New York Times, headlined "Anonymous Louisiana Slaves Regain Identity," to fully appreciate the significance of the historical research embodied in this book.

I had to read this book for a seminar class and was fascinated by it. It documents in much detail the history of colonial Louisiana putting West Africans squarely in the middle of that development. Midlo Hall uses sources from three countries, France, Spain and colonial Britain to document the African presence in Louisiana. She spends some time on the fact that most of the Africans brought to Louisiana were from the Senegambia region of West Africa. Consequently, the Africans brought with them their way of life and were able to exercise much of it in Louisiana. She notes the difference in French/Spanish colonization and the contribution of African language, food and cultural practices in Louisiana. It is well worth reading for it is a history book quite well written that would appeal to the general public. It is entertaining as well as informative.

What I never learned in school about World War II, I learned from this book. I recommend it highly to anyone, from the person who enjoys reading romance stories to history buffs....there is something here for everyone. Captain Samuelson's writings are honest and sometimes painful, as he probably never intended his diaries to be published, and I commend Ms. Midlo for presenting (and thereby preserving) a bit of U.S. history, as well as a story of an extraordinary man.

Contemperaneously made diaries and correspondence of Captain Hymie Samuelson, a young Jewish man from New Orleans, introduces the reader to the life of this soldier in the jungles of the South Pacific. The author matures before your eyes during the two and one-half years he leads a segregated engineering unit in New Guinea The tragedy of his personal life reminds us that war is fought by mere mortals.

I owned this database for a year before I could view it. Thank you reviewer Garland Joseph, for your assistance to access this information. I was near the point where I was ready to throw it away.
I still believe the information should be presented in a manner more easily accessible to everyone. It is well worth the viewing.

I'm considering buying this database, but would like more information on the free software which the author has arranged for in light of customer complaints. Tell me more! Will it come with my order, or do I download it from the internet? Will I receive instructions?

In response to complaints about the need to buy software and the difficulty of access to the data, the author has arranged for free software and a user-friendly search engine with which to use it. ... .